Chapter 4 - Abandonment

I think it would be fair to say that we come from a long line of strength. My mom (Kecia’s Grandmother) lived most of her life in crippling pain. She suffered everyday with symptoms that would send most people running to the doctor. After years of testing without ever finding the cause of her pain, mom just stopped looking. She accepted what she could not change and moved forward with little complaint. While it may have stopped her from ever fully enjoying life, it did not stop her from fulfilling her every obligation...to her family, to her friends, and to her church. When she was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s disease it devastated our family. How could God let such a horrible thing happen to one of His most faithful servants? She had suffered so much in life. Didn’t she at least deserve to have a dignified death? Anyone who knows of Alzheimer’s knows it is anything but dignified. My father, her husband of 47 years, cared for her the entire 10 long years of her decline. She died at home surrounded by family. Kecia, her mom, and I cried together for hours. We cried for the women my mom had been in life and for the way she had died. We cried for the grandmother that my children would never know and for all the wonderful moments she would miss with them. We cried because we missed her…because you are never too old to need your mom. But most of all we cried for what seemed to be so unjust. My dad didn’t cry that night…at least not while we were there. Instead he handled all the business. Calling hospice, filling out papers, standing at her side as the coroners did their thing. When everyone had gone he gave us each a hug and reminded us that we needn’t feel sad for mom anymore because she was basking in the glory of God; free from pain, free of dementia and finally whole again. He said what we already knew, that for Christians death is not “good-bye” it’s just “see ya later”. So while we were down here mourning her loss, she was in Heaven helping to prepare a place for us. We started joking about how she was probably already in God’s kitchen singing as she baked everyone cookies and that the angels would be saying “why didn’t you bring her home sooner?” In the weeks that followed her death, my dad said there were times when he would see something, like her coffee cup, or her old tattered Bible and he would cry…for just a minute. It wouldn’t be like him to break down and wallow in self pity. It just isn’t his style. My parents are people of strong faith, and watching them I know it is true that “we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us”. Anyone who has met my dad knows that he is a strong man. He doesn’t have to say much to get his point across. ( he scared many young men during our teenage dating years). It is for that reason that I was so deeply moved by a phone call I received from him in the early weeks after Kecia’s diagnosis. He had driven Kecia and her mom to the hospital for one of Kecia’s surgeries. It involved drilling small holes into her spine. Several of her vertebrae had been weakened by the cancer that had eaten them away from the inside out so her doctors hollowed them out and filled them with a cement- like substance. It was a day surgery so once she was stable they loaded her up with pain meds and sent her home. My dad had called to tell me how the surgery had gone and to update me on Kecia’s condition. He said she had done well and then his voice began to shake. He relayed to me that when they put her in the car she was still very groggy from the anesthesia so they laid her down in the back seat to rest. Dad and Jeanie were talking softly so as not to disturb her when he heard a tiny, child-like voice from the backseat ask “Grandad, why doesn’t God like me?” That was the first time I have ever heard my dad cry. We sobbed together that day. He said it was hard to watch his grandchild suffer. He hated that he could only stand by and watch as she dealt with the pain and fear that comes with Cancer. But what brought him to tears that day was the realization that Kecia thought, in her greatest time of need, the one who loved her the most had turned His back on her. She thought that God had sent her this terrible disease and then abandoned her at her weakest moment. It was at that moment that Dad understood how terribly alone and frightened she must feel. He began to explain that God had promised to be with her every step of the way if she would allow Him too, but as quickly as she had asked the question, she was asleep again. That conversation would have to wait. Kecia had made it through the first two physical hurdles in her battle with Cancer, but the spiritual battle had only just begun.